Student held for making extortion calls to BJP MLA

Karnataka police officials on Sunday arrested a student from Gurgaon for allegedly making threat calls to several members of parliament (MPs) and members of legislative assembly (MLAs), including Jagroopsinh Rajput, an MLA from Bapunagar.

The student has been identified as Mahesh Ambadi, a native of Bellary town in Karnataka, and student of a Gurgaon-based college.

Two days ago, Rajput approached Odhav police and filed an application, wherein he stated that he had been getting threat calls from an unidentified man who was demanding Rs10 lakh as extortion money. According to the MLA, the caller has threatened to kill him if he failed to pay the amount.

After taking the application, Odhav police officials stepped up security for Rajput and started their investigation.

However, while the probe was still on, Rajput again received the call. He immediately informed Odhav police, who asked him to agree to the caller’s terms. It is learned that Rajput asked the caller to give his bank account number to deposit the money.

Investigation later revealed that the account belonged to Ambadi in Vijaya Bank’s Bangalore branch. On questioning the bank manager, Odhav police officials learnt that Ambadi is wanted by the Karnataka police for making such calls to many MLAs and MPs in Karnataka. This was confirmed after Odhav police contacted Karnataka police officials, who said that Ambadi was on their radar for a long time. 

According to them, Ambadi has made such threat calls to more than eight MLAs and MPs, including many in Karnataka.  When Odhav police traced his mobile number, they learned that Ambadi is currently in Gurgaon. Based on this information and location details, Karnataka police nabbed him on Sunday from Gurgaon.

According to cops, Ambadi is mentally unstable and made threat calls to political leaders after acquiring their phone numbers from the internet.